The Pink Panther is given an assignment by Inspector Clouseau to protect the sons and daughters of world leaders at the prestigious Camp Chilly Wa-Wa, a summer camp so exclusive, no one even knows its exact location. Things get complicated when The Dogfather and his two assistants Pug and Louie arrive, claiming to be from a camp inspection agency, looking for reasons to shut the place down. However, the plot really kicks in when a camper begins feeling homesick...
One of the main focus points is traveling to the various countries the campers hail from (England, Egypt, China, Bhutan, India, and Australia), solving puzzles and learning about their country along the way. But the more you travel, the more you learn of a much sinister plot unfolding back at camp.
The game comes with an in-game PDA, which acts as an encyclopedia on various topics on each country you visit. It also comes with a jukebox that plays music videos that appear in the main story.
A sequel, Pink Panther: Hokus Pokus Pink was released two years later.
Passport to Peril contains the following tropes:
- A Wild Rapper Appears!
- During the last music video, a rescued Nigel all of a sudden breaks out rapping towards the end.
- Prior to that, a beggar in Bombay spontaneously raps about how Indians communicate "yes" and "no" differently through head movements.
- And All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt: In Egypt, Mouth tries to sell one of these t-shirts to Pink Panther.
- Animorphism: In Australia, Pink is told by Kumoken’s father that in the Dreamtime, the Australian Aborigines could freely transform into their totem animals. Today however, only those with a very strong connection to their totems can pull this off. Kumoken, or rather, his spirit, actually does this to transform into a crocodile so he can escape and warn Pink to the dangers unfolding at camp.
- Anti-Villain: The camp director, who is blackmailed by Dogfather to carry out the replacement of the campers with robotic duplicates who hate camp, threatening to turn the real campers into burgers themselves. He even apologizes to Pink when he finds out. That doesn't stop Pink from vacuuming him up with the rest of the Better Camping Bureau.
- Ascended Extra: In the 1993 cartoon, Von Schmarty was a minor reoccurring character that was usually a victim of Pink's antics. Here, he's a close ally to Pink and the Only Sane Man once things at camp take a turn for the worse.
- Bag of Holding: Pink's skin/suit contains a pocket in which he can store whatever he finds during his travels.
- Banana Peel: Clouseau slips on one and falls out of the window of his office just as he zaps Pink to Camp Chilly Wa-Wa.
- Big Bad: Dogfather. He wants to turn the camp into one of his Dog Burger restaurants with the children acting as workers.
- Big Damn Heroes: Pink during the climax. While hiding in the storage cellar from Dogfather and company, he comes across one of the superpowered vacuums Von Schmarty was using at the beginning of the game. Combined with a few extension cords, he vacuums the dogs and the camp owner and frees the kids by draining the mud filled lake, revealing a domed playground where the kids and Von Schmarty were being held.
- Big, Thin, Short Trio: Pug, Louie, and the Dogfather, respectively.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: Attempting to use a scimitar on either Pug or Louie during their confrontation in China will yield this response:Pink: That would be foolish! This is a kid's game!
- British Pubs: Pink visits one while in London, called The Mucky Duck. It is here where Pink rendezvous with Nigel's butler, Jackson.
- Camp Wackyname: Camp Chilly Wa-Wa.
- Chain of Deals: Egypt has one involving a cup of coffee, a rug and a stick of kebab. Somehow they all end up given to Mouth by the end.
- Chekhov's Gun: The superpowered vacuum invented by Von Schmarty initially only shows up in the beginning of the game, and then disappears until the climax, where Pink uses it to dispose of the villains and free the children.
- Color Failure: Happens to the bodyguard at the Chinese opera when Pug and Louie burst in, explained under Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?
- Contrived Coincidence: Not counting Nigel, whose visit to his father was planned, and Indrani, whose parents are never seen, Pink continues to run into the parents of the campers, even if he never had any intentions to visit them.
- In Cairo, he runs into Chione’s parents who happen to be looking for a gift to send to her.
- When he goes to China to follow a language course, a case of mistaken identity leads to Pink being invited to dinner by Young Li’s family and then sent to the rice farm of Young Li’s father.
- After escaping a hijacked plane by parachute, Pink lands in Bhutan's capital, not far from a shop owned by Ananda’s mother.
- After escaping yet another hijacked plane and landing in the Pacific Ocean near Australia, Pink is rescued by Kumoken’s father.
- In addition, Pink comes across one of Nigel's friends from school, who is miserable without him.
- Covers Always Lie: The box cover seems to imply Inspector Clouseau will be Pink's enemy in the game, when in fact he is Pink's ally and employer. He also only appears once at the beginning and once at the end.
- Crapsack World: With each return to camp, the state it's in gets worse and worse. Dead fish and trash bob in the lake, the skies are gray and eerie, everyone's fighting, and the camp director becomes more and more delirious, not to mention he's now got a black eye and appears to be missing a few teeth. Exaggerated upon your final return to camp; the skies are now dark, the robots have taken over everything, the lake is now filled with mud, and a Dog Burger flag now flies where the Chilly Wa-Wa flag once flew.
- Destination Defenestration: Clouseau accidentally does this to himself by slipping on a banana peel. He does this again at the ending when he gets caught up in balloons and confetti.
- Developer's Foresight: You can use the parachute outside of the two occasions Pug and Louie hijack the plane you're on. Doing so will result in the same outcome if you stayed in the plane.
- Face–Heel Turn: Most of the kids you're supposed to protect turn on you when they become homesick, which are later revealed to be robots who were designed to hate camp.
- Fantasy-Forbidding Father: Kumoken’s father has shades of this. Although he does not forbid Kumoken from going to Camp Chilly Wa-Wa, he doesn’t approve of it either, fearing the boy will lose touch with his Aborigine roots.
- Fauxshadow: When Clouseau talks to Pink Panther about his mission to protect the children, he shows him the pictures of eight kids (plus Alice from The Brady Bunch). However, we only get to meet six of them, and though the other two have episodic appearances in cutscenes, the player never learns details about them or gets to visit their cabins and the countries they came from.
- Foreshadowing: There are many clues that reveal the kids are being replaced by robotic doppelgangers as early as "day two".
- When going into the supply shed following the change in time, a disembodied robot hand is seen lying in the middle of the room, which then crawls away.
- The camp director's appearance is based on that of the Little Man, Pink Panther's main antagonist from the original animated shorts. This is a clue to the fact that the director is villainous, and in cahoots with the Better Camping Bureau.
- When going through Nigel's father's mail, Pink discovers a postcard supposedly sent from Nigel that's riddled with spelling errors, despite the fact Nigel is a championship speller. In addition, the postage date on it predates Chilly Wa-Wa's opening.
- Pink comes across a letter from Chione to her parents written in hieroglyphics. When translated by a local Egyptian girl, it claims she's having a great time at camp despite the fact "she" stole one of Von Schmarty's airboards and tried to return to her family in Egypt.
- When Young Li becomes homesick, a weird radio frequency sound plays over his Chinese ramblings.
- Ananda, the camper from Bhutan, has allergy medicine in his cabin. While in Bhutan, you learn from his mother that Ananda is allergic to dogs, despite Von Schmarty seeing him run off with one of Dogfather's goons and didn't appear to be suffering from any allergies.
- Indrani claiming her grandfather was buried in a graveyard, despite the fact people in Varanasi "bury" their dead in the Ganges River.
- One of your first tasks when arriving at the camp is to help Von Schmarty out of a superpowered vacuum cleaner that's apparently powerful enough to suck in everyone's cabins. Guess what you use to defeat Dogfather?
- When first meeting Kumoken, the camper from Australia, he mentions his spirit animal is a crocodile. After uncovering animal tracks leading to Kumoken's plane, the stewardess mentions a crocodile previously boarded the plane prior. Sometime after meeting Kumoken's father, a crocodile with Kumoken's hair shows up, which his father recognizes as a call for help and realizes that the camp is in danger.
- Four-Fingered Hands: Lampshaded when Mouth asks for ten kebabs, sticking out his hands in the process, only to stop mid-sentence to reduce it to eight.
- Fur Is Clothing: When visiting Nigel's father's mansion, Pink is required to dress properly in order to properly enter, proving in the process that his pink fur is actually a suit he can take off. It is then promptly stolen by Pug and Louie, forcing Pink to reclaim it later.
- Gadgeteer Genius: Von Schmarty, who designs many of the inventions seen at camp including hoverboards, spring shoes, and a dial that can change the weather or the time of day.
- Hold Up Your Score: When Pink throws a stick in the Ganges River, the man bathing in it briefly holds up a score sign. He gives Pink a “2 3/4 “.
- Hong Kong Dub: Parodied when Pink faces off with Pug and Louie in China backstage at the opera house.Pug: I like this voice better than my real voice.
- Hover Board: The airboards invented by Von Schmarty.
- Imposter Forgot One Detail: Indrani, the camper from India, tells Pink that she forgot to place marigolds on her grandfather's grave before leaving for camp and seeing that Pink is not that far from India (at this point, Pink's in China), she asks him to stop by the Hindu graveyard he's buried in and place the flowers for her. It's not until he gets to her hometown of Varanasi that he is told by a local that there are no Hindu graveyards in Varanasi. The Ganges River is where people are "buried", not in a graveyard. Pink wonders why Indrani wouldn’t know such a crucial fact about her own culture. Turns out the robotic doppelgangers aren't as smart as their real life counterparts.
- Impersonation-Exclusive Character: The beginning of the game is the only time when you'll see the real children attending the camp, as they're all quickly replaced by robot duplicates by the BCB, and aren't seen again until the game's very end.
- Insane Proprietor: Mouth certainly acts like one.
- Instant Leech: Just Fall in Water!: In China, Pink needs to help a woman retrieve the clothes she lost while doing the laundry in a river, but leeches prevent Pink from simply swimming to them. If the player makes Pink dive into the water anyway, it leads to Pink getting completely covered in leeches.
- Impossible Thief: When the king of Bhutan is impressed by Pink's archery, he offers him a ride to India in his helicopter. However, the helicopter can’t leave because somebody stole the rotor. Pink eventually discovers the thief is the leader of the archery team he helped win, since he wanted Pink to stay and keep playing for them. The problem; the man was with his team, on screen, the whole time between the moment the king arrived and the moment the theft was discovered, so unless he had an accomplice do it for him, how he ever pulled off the theft is a mystery.
- Is This Thing Still On?: The second time Pug and Louie hijack Pink's plane, they decide to keep the fact that they are flying the plane now a secret from him so he won't escape again like the first time. Unfortunately, they forget to switch off the intercom so Pink can clearly follow the conversation they are having inside the cockpit, thus alerting him to the (nonexistent) danger.
- Lampshade Hanging: The "Taj Mahal" Song being an oddly serious and emotionally wrought ballad in contrast to the other countries getting fairly cheesy music is acknowledged with Pink nearly being in tears when it cuts back to the game.Pink: That was beautiful! *sniffles* I... have a job to finish. I really must go.
- Large Ham: Mouth, an Egyptian man who's going crazy from hunger and thirst. His camel, Lucy, is Pink's only chance of getting to the Nile. This sets up a large chain of trades for some kebab, a rug, and a cup of (lukewarm) coffee for him.
- Literal-Minded: While in Varanasi, Pink comes across a Jain woman, who explains to him some of her religion's rules of not killing anything. Pink then asks her if "killing time" is allowed, which the woman says she'll have to ask.
- Loose Floorboard Hiding Spot: The storage cellar of Camp Chilly Wa-Wa has one of these. Pink can use it to hide the evidence he has gathered against The Dogfather, most prominently the two letters he picked up in England and Egypt.
- Made of Iron: Pug and Louie manage to survive being turned into plants in Egypt, and a plane crash in the Himalayas.
- Me's a Crowd: When Pink comes across a rug vendor in Egypt, he claims to have a rug of any shape and size. Pink decides to challenge this claim by asking for a Pink Panther rug, which he promptly pulls out, which is practically a Pink Panther version of a bearskin rug. He assures Pink, however, that it is synthetic.
- Meaningful Name: Chione, the camper from Egypt, says her name means "daughter of the Nile". Pink responds by saying his name means "light red". Indrani also states her name means "Goddess of the sky."
- Mistaken Identity: In China, Pink is mistaken for a famous opera singer.
- Monumental Damage: Louie spray paints a heart on one of the stones at Stonehenge. While they believe this is a simple Evil Is Petty moment, defacing a monument that ancient is a serious crime.
- Mythology Gag
- The camp owner and a Bollywood star in India are modeled after Little Man from the original cartoon shorts. Bonus points for the fact that the Little Man is the main antagonist of Pink Panther in the animated shorts, and the camp owner turns out to be a villain due to being in leagues with the Better Camping Bureau.
- Nigel's father resembles Manly Man from the 1993 cartoon.
- Characters from the 1993 iteration of the cartoon make cameos in Pink's PDA. The Ant and the Aardvark appear in the "People" and "Food" hub, respectively, Voodoo Man appears in the "Clothing" hub, Mrs. Chubalingo appears in the "Places" hub, and Little Man appears in the "Culture" hub.
- Never Heard That One Before: When Pink comes across a lamp vendor in Cairo, he's not amused when Pink begins to ask him if any of the lamps are magic lamps and proceeds to rant about how after Aladdin came out, everyone's been asking him if he has one, which he denies. He's lying, naturally.
- Never Smile at a Crocodile: In Egypt, a crocodile prevents Pink from simply swimming across the Nile to a boat that is on the other shore.
- Pink encounters a much friendlier crocodile in Australia. It's actually Kumoken's spirit, transformed into his totem animal to escape, and warn his father, and Pink, that the camp is in even more trouble. Pink receives this message and immediately heads back.
- No Delays for the Wicked: No matter what happens to them, Pug and Louie always manage to catch up with Pink again to keep causing trouble for him.
- No Name Given: The camp owner is only called "boss" by Pink and no one else calls him by name.
- Noodle Incident
- Pink mentions the last time Clouseau magically zapped him to a different location wasn't very pretty on his end, going in detail about how hard it was to get his fur back to normal.
- When coming across an Indian boy mourning his grandfather, Pink mistakes his shaved head for a botched haircut, mentioning his first haircut was botched as well.
- Only One Who Likes Spam: The cup of coffee that is part of Pink's Chain of Deals in Egypt is lukewarm. The first two people Pink gives it to hand it back to Pink for that precise reason, but Mouth, the last one to get the coffee, actually likes his coffee lukewarm.
- Out-of-Character Alert
- One of your first tasks is to retrieve Nigel's Guy Fawkes dummy, one of his most treasured items, in an attempt to ease his homesickness. When you return to camp and give it to him, he doesn't recognize it. When Pink tries to jog his memory, "Nigel" lights a match and burns it, what children in England usually do to them.
- For some reason, Young Li only speaks Chinese after becoming homesick, but Pink later learns that the boy supposedly speaks at least 4 languages. Even stranger, his best language is not Chinese, but English.
- Von Schmarty claims he saw Ananda with one of the dogs from the Better Camping Bureau, and somehow the boy seemed totally fine despite being allergic to dogs.
- At first, Von Schmarty is just as concerned as Pink is when it comes to the homesick campers. However, after returning back to camp from India, "Von Schmarty" insists that Pink take a break, despite the camp slowly deteriorating and more homesick campers still unaccounted for. When Pink tries confronting "Von Schmarty" about things still needing to be done, he pretty much tells Pink "You're on your own, now!" and retires to his cabin.
- Palette Swap: All of the stewardesses use the same model, but recolored to match the ethnicity of the country that plane comes from.
- Perpetual Smiler: Ananda's mother.
- Pit Trap: Pink uses one of these, along with a salad as bait, to get rid of Pug and Louie in Egypt.
- Politically Correct History: Averted; the game makes absolutely no secret about how the Australian Aborigines were mistreated by the European colonists.
- The game also doesn't sugarcoat the fact that women in India are constantly discriminated against, no matter what caste they belong to. It's this reason why Indrani is attending camp, as she's fighting for women's rights in her country.
- The PDA gets in on the action with a section dedicated to Bhutan's prejudice towards Nepalese immigrants, something that Bhutanese UN representatives told Wanderlust NOT to mention.
- Produce Pelting: While in China, Pink has to give a performance in a Chinese opera (see Mistaken Identity above). However, if he enters the stage without the required costume and makeup, the audience will start throwing tomatoes at him.
- The Professor: Von Schmarty.
- Red Herring: When stranded in Bhutan, Pink mentions he'll do anything to get to India, even if he has to go by yak. Sure enough, he finds a yak in a nearby village. The game makes you think you can skip finding the missing rotor and just go by yak, but no matter what you give the yak, which claims to be looking for a snack, nothing will entice it to be ridden by Pink.
- Ridiculous Future Sequelisation: The in-flight movie in all the private jets is Sister Act 16.
- Ridiculously Human Robots: The robots created by The Dogfather to replace the children and later Von Schmarty look real enough to fool everyone. At least until they start shorting out and falling apart near the end of the game.
- Robotic Reveal: The kids and Von Schmarty slowly begin short circuiting more and more each time you return to camp. You later find a robot head in the camp's supply cellar.
- Running Gag
- The campers' parents' inability to pronounce the camp's name correctly.
- Pug and Louie hijacking Pink's plane. By the second time, Pink isn't even the slightest bit worried since he knows he can just use the parachute to escape. If anything, he's more annoyed than concerned.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Pink does this when Clouseau gives him his next assignment: undercover lunch lady. This ends up setting up the sequel.Clouseau: I've already ordered your hair net.
- Shout-Out
- Once night falls rather early on the first day, after all of the campers say goodnight to each other, a random voice chimes in "Goodnight John-Boy."
- The grid of campers shown to Pink by Clouseau has Alice in the middle.
- A comic book obtained by Pink in London is called Judge Conan 1999 1/9.
- There's also this exchange between Pink and the lamp vendor in Cairo.
Pink: This may sound like a silly question, but...Lamp Vendor: Do I have a magic lamp? You just saw Aladdin and you're looking for your very own genie, complete with a name voice talent! Welcome to reality! There's no three wishes, there's no Robbie Williams, just plain brass, pots, and hot sun. What can I get you?Pink: Uh, nothing. Thanks.Genie: Cynic.- When Pink comes across a river filled with leeches in China, clicking on it enough times causes him to pick one up and pretend that it's entertainment reporter Robin Leach.
- When meeting Young Li’s father, Pink asks him to translate a sentence that Young Li kept repeating when Pink last saw him at the camp. The translation: I’m glad to pay you Tuesday for one hamburger today.
- The "disguises" Pug and Louie don when hijacking Pink's plane to India resemble the outfits of the Native American chief and the construction worker from The Village People.
- During the archery contest in Bhutan, Pink has to trade an arrow for a bow from Ananda's mother, leaving him arrow-less. So instead of an arrow, Pink uses a chicken.
- Shown Their Work: Various cultures seen in the game (the caste system, the Aboriginal Dreamtime, Chinese opera, Bhutanese archery, etc.) are portrayed quite accurately. The in-game PDA shows this off even more with dozens of articles which discuss various topics (food, culture, wildlife, clothing, religion, etc.) from each country you visit.
- Shrinking Violet: Nigel. During the meet n' greet with the other campers, he's the only one you can't directly talk to and you need to entice him with a fishing rod. It also kickstarts the whole plot, as you need to get the fishing rod from the locked supply shed, with Dogfather watching you enter the code for the lock.
- Suddenly Voiced: Much like the 1993 cartoon series, Pink talks in this game. Then again, having a mute main character in a dialog-heavy adventure game wouldn't be the greatest of ideas.
- Surprisingly Moving Song: In India, Pink (and thus the player) is treated to a song about the history of the Taj Mahal and Shah Jahan, the emperor who built it for his wife who died from complications of childbirth. With lyrics like "And this emperor couldn't stop his tears / the news confirmed his darkest fears" and "three hundred years have passed somehow / two lovers lie together now", it's hard not to tear up. Pink himself is on the verge of crying once the song ends.
- Take That!: One of the things Kumoken's father lists off when talking about "evil goodies" the "white man" brought upon the Aboriginals is "Joanie Loves Chachi reruns."
- The Teetotaler: Pink is one, due to his claim that cartoon characters don't drink, when the bartender at the Mucky Duck attempts to take his order.
- Teleport Gun: Since even Pink is not allowed to know the exact location of the camp, Clouseau uses one of these to teleport him there. Pink is not at all thrilled about having to travel this way.
- Those Two Guys: Pug and Louie, who follow you for most of your globetrotting. Then there's the two campers who discuss and later fight about the differences of their countries.
- Took a Level in Jerkass: The kids become less and less friendly to Pink once they become homesick; Indrani demanding Pink place flowers on her grandfather's grave, even after his plane accident, and Kumoken locking him in the supply cellar. Justified, those kids are long gone by this point.
- Video Game Cruelty Potential:
- When searching for Young Li's father in some rice fields, Pink has to help a woman retrieve her laundry that's stuck on a branch in a river. Only problem? It's infested with leeches, and Pink absolutely refuses to dive in and swim towards the laundry. Clicking the river enough times will cause Pink to dive headfirst into the river, jumping out covered in leeches.
- Less cruel, but not nice either, in the Chinese opera, you can endlessly keep forcing Pink to go on stage while he’s not properly dressed yet, resulting in a Produce Pelting every time.
- Visual Pun: Pink pulls out signs with rebuses on them (nut case, screwball, bird brain, etc.) when noticing that the camp director is oblivious to the camp's deterioration, waving at campers who aren't actually there.
- Who Is Driving?: The first time Pug and Louie hijack Pink's plane (while it's on its way from China to India), they leave the cockpit to confront Pink. Then the plane begins to shake, prompting Pink to ask the two who is flying now that they are in the cabin with him. Cue an Oh, Crap! response from Louie, who quickly rushes back into the cockpit.
- Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Nunchuck, the bodyguard at the Chinese opera building, is terrified of dogs, hence why he is of no help when Pug and Louie break into the place.
